Testimony By FBI And Elected Officials Allow Hamas Supporting Imam To Be Given Permanent Residency In U.S.

September 5, 2008

Testimony By FBI And Elected Officials Allow Hamas Supporting Imam To Be Given Permanent Residency In U.S.

By BEILA RABINOWITZ and WILLIAM MAYER

September 5, 2008 - San Francisco, CA - PipeLineNews.org - On Thursday a Newark immigration judge ruled that Mohammad Qatanani, the imam of the Islamic Center of Passaic County, can become a permanent resident in the U.S. together with his wife and three foreign born children.

Qatanini had been fighting deportation proceedings brought by U.S. immigration officials who claimed that that he "failed to disclose on his green card application a prior arrest and conviction in Israel for being a member of Hamas."

The case garnered national media attention due to the high profile U.S. law enforcement officials who testified on his behalf and the hundreds of supporters who held a vigil outside the courthouse.

Among those officials duped into supporting Qatanani were U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie, Weysan Dun, the special agent in charge of the FBI's Newark office, U.S. Representative Bill Pascrell (D-NJ) the director of the New Jersey Office of Homeland Security. County prosecutors and sheriffs also testified on Qatanani's behalf. Christie who attended a Ramadan fast-breaking meal at Qatanani's mosque, gushed that, "My view is he's always had a very good relationship with us, and he's a man of great good will." [source, http://wcbstv.com/topstories/Muslim.Hearing.united.2.810173.html]

According to the Investigative Project's expose "The Latest "Interfaith" Imam With Terror Ties."

"Qatanani was a speaker at an Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP) conference in Chicago on November 27, 1999, introduced as the new imam of the Patterson Islamic Center in New Jersey. IAP conferences are not good venues to participate or attend if one is trying to disprove an association with Hamas. IAP is no longer an active organization, but for years it was a central player in Hamas' U.S. support network. Mousa Abu Marzook, currently the Deputy Political Bureau Chief for Hamas in Damascus, gave IAP $490,000 and is a former IAP board member."

Of additional concern, Qatanani endorses the practice of financial assistance to the children of suicide bombers.

Mohammad Qatanani, spiritual leader of the Islamic Center of Passaic County, posed a hypothetical question: What if the charity did support the children of suicide bombers? What would be wrong with that, he wondered?"There is a big issue between supporting them before, not after," suicide attacks," he said. He compared the support of orphans of suicide bombers to supporting the children of terrorists like Timothy McVeigh for instance, or the children of the man who killed former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin." [source, ibid]

Federal prosecutors however, take exception to Qatanani's veiled endorsement of suicide bombing, "the government makes the case that by supporting dead terrorists' families [the] Holy Land [Foundation] "effectively rewarded past, and encouraged future, suicide bombings and terrorist activities on behalf of Hamas." [source, ibid]

Qatanani has a history of supporting terror friendly groups and organizations, including praying for "our brothers and sisters" in Chechnya and the defendants in the Hamas terror funding prosecution, U.S. vs Holy Land Foundation.

Perversely, Qatanini's bid to avoid deportation was rewarded with legal residency for him and his family, by the cowardice of U.S. officials - who seven years into the war on terror - might be expected to understand that Hamas is part of the violent Islamic jihad network and is thus, the enemy.

If nothing else, this miscarriage of justice proves once again the danger to the West posed by Muslim interfaith activities which in this case allowed Qatanani to cow political and law enforcement officials. As a result another terrorism supporter has succeeded in gaining an unassailable foothold in the United States, scoring a victory for the cultural or "stealth" jihad. http://www.pipelinenews.org/index.cfm?page=qatananiid=9.5.08%2Ehtm